1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to the field of hair styling, and more particularly to a novel foil and method for coloring hair.
2. Description of Related Art
The coloring, highlighting, and frosting of hair are popular methods of altering or accenting the color and/or look of a person's hair. In a typical hair coloring process, a patient's hair is carefully painted with a coloring agent including a liquid dye or bleach. Various tools are used to accurately control which strands of hair are subjected to the coloring agent and which are not.
The common foil method of coloring hair involves the use of rectangular sheets of aluminum foil. A rectangular sheet of aluminum foil is held against a subject's head, and set of the subject's hair strands located above the sheet are selected and positioned on the sheet. After a liquid coloring agent is applied to the selected set of hair strands, the sheet of aluminum foil is folded to enclose the treated set of hair strands. The above process is repeated for each set of hair strands to be treated.
A problem arises with the foil method in that the sheets of aluminum foil have a tendency to move or slip during and after the application of the liquid coloring agent, and the coloring agent sometimes drips or otherwise escapes from the sheets of aluminum foil. When the escaped coloring agent contacts portions of non-selected strands of the subject's hair, the result is an undesirable spotted, uneven look.
The state of the art in the present field is described in Russell, U.S. Pat. No. 6,863,076, which teaches a foil used for coloring hair that includes an elongate strip of hooked material on either side of the foil to facilitate placement of the foil in the subject's hair. A pinked upper edge of the foil is pushed upwardly into the subject's hair, and the hooked material captures the hair to hold the hair in place.
The disadvantage of this arrangement is that the foil has little rigidity, and is difficult to push deep into the subject's hair, into the roots. Since it is advantageous to position the foil deep into the subject's hair, into the roots, this can be a difficult problem to overcome. Yet this problem cannot be overcome with the Russell foil, because the gripping strips are on opposite sides of the foil.
It would be advantageous to have a foil and method for coloring hair that enables a stylist to quickly and easily position the foil deep into the roots of the subject's hair, and to reduce the tendency of thin sheets to crumble, or to slip during and after application of a liquid coloring agent.